Common Name: Example: House cat (this is the animal you selected from the list)

Scientific Name:  Is just the genus and species  Example: Felis domesticus (Genus capital, both names italic)

Full Taxonomic Name:

Kingdom

Phylum

Class

Order                                    You can find this on Wikipedia

Family

Genus

Species

Predators, Threats:  In this section you will write about the challenges and stresses on the animal – does it have a natural predator?  Can it only survive in certain temperatures or conditions?

Habitat/Range:

Habitat – does it live in the grass, in a river, up a tree?

Range – Where on Earth is it located – only in Australia, worldwide, deserts, etc.

Physical Anatomical Characteristics (label on poster): What does it look like?

Adaptations – Long nose of anteater, long neck of giraffe, etc

Coloration – Is it hidden in it’s habitat, or does it have warning colors.

Behavior/Diet:

What does it eat?  Does it hunt at night (nocturnal)?  Does it do something no other animal does?

We studied the Mexican art of making amate paper from mulberry bark and using that for bright symbolic paintings.  The students did two paintings each.  Squares of brown paper bag were wrinkled, treated with an India ink wash, then ironed flat when dry to simulate the color and texture of amate paper.  Everyone did so well, I hope you enjoy them.

I. Absolute and relative dating

• Absolute dating is a method of estimating the age of an object in years – it uses the known half-life of radioactive materials
• The half-life of an atom is how long it takes half of the atoms to decay
• Relative dating is a method of sequencing events in the order they happened – it determines the age of an object relative to other objects or events in a sequence

II. Geologic Time Scale – a model of the history of life on Earth

• Highlights of life on Earth
• Earth was formed 4.6 billion years ago, starting the Precambrian era
• 3.4 billion years ago, life appeared on Earth (bacteria).
• Modern humans appeared 40,000 years ago.

Precambrian Era – Over 540 million years ago

• No oxygen, rich in other gases – carbon monoxide, carbon dioxide, hydrogen, and nitrogen.
• A lot of chaos – Meteorites crashed into the Earth’s surface; violent thunderstorms and volcanic eruptions were constant; intense Ultraviolet radiation from the sun
• Life started from the chemicals that already existed in the environment.
• As time passed, these chemicals became more and more complex
• Earth was believed to have began 4.6 billion years ago

Paleozioc Era – 540 million – 248 million years ago

Types of Organisms:

• Plants, fungi, air-breathing animals
• All major plants except flowering plants
• Crawling insects and some reptiles
• The Paleozoic era ended with a mass extinction, killing over 90% of marine animals.

Mesozoic Era – 240 million – 65 million years ago

• A giant meteorite (space rock) hit the Earth that generated dust clouds.
• Dust and smoke blocked sunlight.
• Without sunlight, the plants died.
• Without plants, plant-eating animals died.
• Without plant-eating animals, animal-eating animals died.

Types of Organisms

• Dinosaurs
• Giant Marine lizards
• First birds
• Flowering plants

Cenozoic Era – 65 million years ago – today – Age of the Mammals
Types of Organisms

• Mastodons
• Saber-tooth Tigers
• Camels
• Horses
• Humans

III. Fossils
Fossilized organism, trace fossil (footprint, worm trail), cast fossil (organism decays and leaves a mold that minerals fill)

            Rock Cycle

• Igneous – Formed by melting & crystallization, Basalt
• Sedimentary – Formed by sedimentation and compaction, Sandstone
• Metamorphic – Formed by heat and pressure, Marble

• Minerals move through the rock cycle in response to the conditions; weathering, erosion, heat, pressure, etc.

IV. Plate Tectonics

• Earth’s layers from the inside; inner core, outer core, mentle and crust
• Current day continents emerged from Pangea, a supercontinent that has since broken apart
• Plate Boundaries
• Oceanic as well as continental plates

1. Divergent Boundary – plates pulling apart
2. Convergent Boundary – plates coming together
3. Transform Boundary – plates sliding against each other (faults)
4. Subduction Zone – one plate being pushed onder by another

We are studying the History of Earth and Life on Earth. To learn more, click here to go to UC Berkeley’s great site for understanding geologic time.

There’s even a worksheet for taking notes as you go through the activity! geologic_time_web

Here’s a cool family outing, my friends and students. It’s a chance to look at fossils, cool beads and crystals, meteorites, fluorescent rocks, and also talk to geologists. What’s not to like!